On Friday 01 April 2011, Stefano Lattarini wrote: > Reference to thread: > <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/automake-patches/2011-04/msg00001.html> > Reference to parent message: > <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/automake-patches/2011-04/msg00011.html> > > On Friday 01 April 2011, Stefano Lattarini wrote: > > On Friday 01 April 2011, Ralf Wildenhues wrote: > > > * Stefano Lattarini wrote on Fri, Apr 01, 2011 at 03:13:19PM CEST: > > > > On Friday 01 April 2011, Ralf Wildenhues wrote: > > > > > Patch 2: > > > > > - Should `--install -I $dir' also create an absolute $dir? > > > > > > > > > I think so. Why shouldn't it? > > > > > > Well, I don't understand what a legitimate use case would be, that's > > > why. You need a relative path anyway for --install to copy files there. > > > aclocal won't install to an absolute first -I directory, > > > > Unfortunately, this is not the case (even if such a behaviour is > documented). For example, with aclocal 1.11.1: > > $ cd /tmp > $ mkdir foo.dir > $ cd foo.dir > $ echo 'AC_INIT(x,0) AC_PROG_LIBTOOL' > configure.ac > $ mkdir m4 > $ aclocal --install -I `pwd`/m4 > aclocal: installing `/tmp/foo.dir/m4/libtool.m4' from > `/usr/share/aclocal/libtool.m4' > aclocal: installing `/tmp/foo.dir/m4/ltoptions.m4' from > `/usr/share/aclocal/ltoptions.m4' > aclocal: installing `/tmp/foo.dir/m4/ltsugar.m4' from > `/usr/share/aclocal/ltsugar.m4' > aclocal: installing `/tmp/foo.dir/m4/ltversion.m4' from > `/usr/share/aclocal/ltversion.m4' > aclocal: installing `/tmp/foo.dir/m4/lt~obsolete.m4' from > `/usr/share/aclocal/lt~obsolete.m4' > $ ls -l m4 > total 292 > -rw-r--r-- 1 stefano stefano 260519 Apr 1 20:06 libtool.m4 > -rw-r--r-- 1 stefano stefano 11938 Apr 1 20:06 ltoptions.m4 > -rw-r--r-- 1 stefano stefano 4372 Apr 1 20:06 ltsugar.m4 > -rw-r--r-- 1 stefano stefano 703 Apr 1 20:06 ltversion.m4 > -rw-r--r-- 1 stefano stefano 5707 Apr 1 20:06 lt~obsolete.m4 > > The bug is present also in maint; see the attached testcase which should > be an exposer. > > Regards, > Stefano > I've thought a little more about this, and I now think this bug shouldn't be fixed by changing the current aclocal real behaviour, but rather the documentation. I.e., we should make things simpler and consistent, and, when `--install' is used, simply copy third-party m4 files in the first directory specified by `-I', whether absolute or not. The rationale for this is that the only reason the documented `--install' behaviour would exist is to allow users to work around the non-existence of ACLOCAL_PATH by specifying ACLOCAL='aclocal -I /some/system/dir' (as Ralf pointed out) -- but we could solve the need of this workaround by applying the pending patches for ACLOCAL_PATH support Paolo has already written for us.
WDYT? Regards, Stefano
